Red Letters
by Amethiyst Rhodes
Summary: TMNT 2005 PreFF This is the story of the Slayer after his separation from Bishop. A little love story.
1. Chapter 1

This is but a small story, one so small and obsolete, that it is easily ignored. It barely affected anyone of that time, but to the few who it did effect- it changed their lives. (I can't say 'forever', for it certainly did not do that much changing, and to little was done to make anything of the sort last 'forever'. ) It's a cute little love story, with a few odd characters strewn within it. By anyone who knew the story, the tale was referred to as 'The Red Letters'.

* * *

As quickly as they came, they were gone. He didn't watch them leave- he had a trap to rebuild. Who were they to judge him? _Monster..._ They weren't quite human either- so who were they to say? There was something else, he knew, but he couldn't put his finger on it. He hated them, well, alright. Maybe 'Hate' as a word itself didn't quite describe it, but that was the closest he got. They were enemies to him...

He picked up one of their discarded shrunken, looking into it's scratched and finger-printed surface. He looked into one of his eyes- how fake it was. The other was brown, like that man in his nightmares. He could see the Night's Man in his own reflection, and thus cast it from him. The sharp metal fund itself lodged into the decaying brick wall, and in his mind he could measure the exact distance- 75.877 meters away.

He climbed to the collapsed roof, perching his hooked toes on the ashy fault line. Looking down, he saw his thousands of subjects staring up at him. They all depended upon him. For shelter, for food, and they looked for his brilliance to aide them. Those who served, survived. Unlike the rest of their kind in the vast city beyond, they were strong, large- _fed_. Their Blue-Blood had always managed to bring them food, often alive. He then took some of their strange, removable, outer layer for himself. He wore them as triumph- or so could his subjects understand. The rats looked up at him, trustingly. He would have to go out and hunt again.

The four that had just left haunted him as he jumped the chain-link border of his smallish-kingdom. Looking up, the saw the usual scenery, the stable structures in which prey so abundantly thrived. It never bothered him that they looked a lot like him in structure- for he knew. He was above them. Night's Man had told him every nightmare, every memory that came to mind. The words themselves were a little drowned out, but by his face and pride- yes. This monster was beyond all the others.

There, the feeding warehouse. It was filled with smaller preys, ones to weak fight back. Females of the Prey were always the weaker ones, who tasted better, but often had more fat on them. However, the males were a little rough, and these were easier to get. Here, there was jackpot. So many of them, asleep. The dumb, weak creatures...what a find. Besides, there were always more of them. The Blue-Blooded Monster made no hesitation.

Walking in through the glassed-up opening through the wall (and it opened so easily from the outside at this altitude), he made his advancement. His eyes glanced around the room, looking for the meatier ones. He found four right off the bat, and threw them over his shoulder. One of them woke, so a quick hit over the head silenced her. Picking up a few others, he turned to leave. They were so easy to carry! With a light and accomplished heart, he headed back home to feed his subjects.

* * *

"Are all of the relatives like that?" Casey interjected, leaping from one roof to another. "Or were those removed?"

"Don't use such big words, Case." Raph laughed, "You'll lose Mikey."

With a quick protest, the orange and red bandannas found themselves rolling around on the rooftops, trying to gain the upper hand. What grace, and what form, rivaling brothers shared. Don and Leo opted to stay out of the single fray. Casey shrugged his shoulders and moved on toward his own apartment. April was probably waiting to clobber him for something he didn't do again. Turning, he decided to use his brain for once.

"Hey- you guys said that you recognized the style." He noted. "Who do ya think it was?"

Don tapped his bo against his head. He _did_ remember that style, oh so familiar, but who it belonged to was a little beyond him. Leo seemed to have similar trouble.

"Well, it wasn't Shredder's. That I know. And I doubt it was Karai's..." Mikey interjected from beneath Raph. "They kinda fight similar..."

"Then who does that leave?" Casey asked. Why he pursued the answer, he didn't care. There was just something buggin the edge of his brain. A possibility.

"Well, a lot of the stuff he did wasn't supposed to be humanly possible." Don recalled. "For instance, when he flipped off the side of the building- he should have either snapped in half or his his head on the building behind him- much less land so in a way he could _run."_

"Well, it doesn't matter. He was eaten by the rats." Leo hissed, pressing onward. Don shrugged to Casey, and in return, the vigilante nodded and went his own way.

"If you don't mind, I think I'll skip seeing more rats tonight." he whined, in reference to Splinter. Raph faked a stab in defense of his Sensei, and they quickly parted.

* * *

"Bishop-" Stockman came in to see his boss bent over a pale blue figure, yet half-alive. Blood covered his hands, and underlings spun around him in assist.

"What is it now, Stockman?" He didn't even look up.

"The Slayer...do you think he's still alive?"

The veins tightened in his boss's hands. The thin, horror-movie fingers nearly slipped, but quickly regained composure. A deep breath steadied the body, and still the boss did not look up.

"What makes you bring It up?"

"Well, for the fact that we can't find it..."

"Of course you can find it." His boss sighed, the poison on his tongue spraying all over his underling. "You yourself said so. Matter of fact, you said you had."

"Well...turns out the mechanical piece that was track-able has detached- and the actual-"

"Are you saying that you _failed_?"

"N-no sir. I-"

"Because if you have, then"

He made a loud, quick tear through the flesh of the creature, just as an emphasis on his permanent offer to the failures. The underlings zipping about him grew a little faster in response. Stockman swallowed hard.

"Um...never mind..." Stockman retreated back to his lab area. There was no way to track the Super Human- except for DNA, which would end up picking plenty of them nearby- his boss being one of them.

"What a shame. Can never have a full conversation with that man..."


	2. Chapter 2

It was the best play. After reading the book and watching a boot-leg version of the movie, her one life's goal was to see the play, legally or not, comfortably or not, and despite her circumstances, she _knew_ she was going to see it. And, as every other girl had quickly learned, she would _live_ the story until then. She had already dug deep into every source she could find, memorizing the stage, sets and every line that was spoken upon them. She did not care what the others would say. She had one, small, insignificant stroke of life, and she was investing it in _The Phantom of the Opera._

She had nothing other to waste her life on anyways. Her parents were gone, for, her father died from a failed surgery, and her mother died in giving birth to a still-born child. She was then pushed aside into an orphanage, where she could be stored away with many other girls in the same situation. There, in every room, in every single bed, lied a young girl, all alone in the crowd they formed. It was a perfect lack of love.

So, when the figures of the night came to take them away, the small packages of meat did not fight. If they were awake, many of them pretended to be asleep. No one fought back- no one dared. They all knew that succumbing to this rapture would end in death- but such a peaceful sleep was welcomed. Who ever this character was, he had become the method or Mercy.

Shaye waited for him to come into her own window. Every hour of the day passed so slowly, dreaming of the horror who stole young girls. Maybe this place wouldn't be so bad if they were treated well, but said condition was far from the case. Even the 'Lil Ol' Orphan Annie' would have lost all hope here.

That left one goal for every girl under the roof of the orphanage. Eat well, stay healthy, and pray that he would come for you that night. Shaye wanted it, for what she thought, most of all. She wanted him to take her away. And, until then, she would kept her eyes locked on her dear _Phantom, _her _Opera Ghost_ named Erik.

* * *

"He's still ticking me off." Raph groaned. "That rat guy." 

"I guess telling you to 'let it go' again wouldn't help." Don mused, his face up in his work. Mikey was hanging over his shoulder, waiting for an opportunity to make a mess of things. Leo didn't pay mind to either of them, just hacking his swords against various dummies he had set up about him.

"Yeah, Leo. Lighten Up." Raph tried to catch his brother's lighter side, but the boy in blue didn't even seem to hear him. Raph paused before turning back to the game behind the screens. "Speaking of light, I think the sun should be coming up soon."

"Along with Master Splinter...G'night guys!" Bouncing off to bed, Mikey waved his hand to the brothers now behind him. He scooped up Klunk in his arms and vanished into the fortress of comics. His bed was in there somewhere. Then again, so was the second remote to the game, a few of Don's power tools, seven pairs of chopsticks, and whatever else the klepto had decided to appropriate. He had always managed to use his innocent sleep tactics to get out of early morning trainings.

Don let a bit of his guard down over his machine. With Mikey gone, he didn't have to worry so much about things being messed with. Still, his eyes were locked on his work. Raph couldn't quite see what it was, but it looked promising. Maybe it was something to get Leo back to his senses...

"Michaelangelo!" The oriental door slid open under the soft, gentle pressure of the fuzzy four fingered hand. "You should be quieter when escaping. You might not have woke me otherwise."

Leo turned and bowed to his master. The rat bowed in return, a good morning wish in his heart. However, a cold chill ran down his spine. The living machine would not receive his warm welcome to the morning. He watched his son return to training, like a program, one running itself toward destruction. The pressure was sealed, and his son was trying to turn the lid tighter...Splinter knew it was only a matter of time.

Don waved to his sensei from the machinery. The master smiled. It was good to see him back in business after the recent slump. He was never able to catch any wind of the math that his young one thrived on, but it made no matter to him. The line of work had saved them numerous times. Splinter knew he could take pride in Donatello.

Mikey was still hiding. With a sigh, he looked to Raph. This message was understood, and Raph happily took off after his brother. It wasn't long before the two came back, squabbling as they went along. Ah, brothers. It was times like these when Splinter found himself thanking fate for never having to deal with his own.

"Hey! I know it's early and all, and you guys are just about to go t' bed, but I thought you might find this interesting. It was an article towards the back of April's Paper..." Casey strode in, mask on the top of his head. He held up his right hand for everyone to see, where a gray strip of flimsy news paper dangled. On it giant bold letters read **_BLACK HOLE ORPHANAGE: 50 GIRLS MISSING_**.

"Is there a reward?!" Mikey blurted from under Raph's arm. This only forced him to suffer a bang on the side of his head from the butt of the sai.

"What has that got to do with us, Casey?" Leo drove his katana into the side of the dummy, which then fell apart onto the floor.

"Hate to say it, but Leo's right. This is a job for some detective or something." Don paused, and then quickly added, "No, Mikey. Official people. They can figure this out themselves..."

"But it doesn't need any figurin!" Casey stressed. "I already know who did it! Remember when we were int hat tower-trap thing last night? The bones, I thought they were a little small. Now the answer's right here! He's taking these little girls-"

"Casey, listen to yourself!" Raph groaned. "You're tired, and you're thinking. That's a bad combination and you know it."

Casey growled, and not bothering to even notice Splinter, who was growing tired of the fact that he didn't know what was going on, left with the article in hand. "Fine. I'll do it myself then."

A few moments of silence followed the slam of the lair's door. Splinter sighed, turning to the tea kettle in the kitchen. Before his tail had disappeared into the connecting room, he let a few words drift toward his sons. "Go, follow him before he causes any trouble. Just be careful."

* * *

There were thousands of little dots on the radar screen. Each one were matches to the boss's DNA sample. Stockman couldn't believe that he was doing this. Further more, he couldn't believe that his boss hadn't picked up on that fact that he was doing it. Maybe he just hadn't had his coffee yet. 

Most of the circles were in a large, rectangle shaped blob that was located deep inside Area 51, where most of the clones were kept in suspended animation. They had been transported there from the New York base a day or so after the lab had been destroyed. Being, essentially, in a state much like a coma, they did not move at all. The only circle that did move was a good distance away, scrolling on the other side of the lab. That, with simple logic, was quickly concluded to be Agent Bishop himself. He was moving across the radar rather slowly, and thus it was almost a fact in Stockman's mind that the boss did not have his coffee yet.

So in the short run, not a bit of DNA was out of place. Stockman grumbled. He knew for a fact that Slayer was no where in the containment center. Taking a deep breath, he opened the radar to the entire continental US, in which he spent much time scanning. Shocked by the discovery, he closed in on NY, NYC, and then finally Manhattan itself. Shocked, he opened up Manhattan in detail. There is was. It was some abandoned land off on the Lower East side of the Island's City. He immediately brought up the visual PA, on which Bishop was soon called to.

"Is it possible to send small cameras to a certain area?" Stockman was giddy to his brim.

Catching on to the idea as quickly as he usually did, Bishop let out a small smile. "Have the order carried out immediately."


End file.
